Great Training Week and Happy Spring!

I had another great training week capped off today with a 3700 yard swim (death by 200's I call it) followed by a 2-hour run, where I ended up running 13.67 miles in 2:01:44, so I guess on a flat-ish course, my running is coming along just fine!

This morning I had to decide where I wanted to run.  I wanted to hit up Waterfall Glen so I could test up my hill strength acquired from last week's 1/2 marathon in Cary.  But I figured it would be muddy and generally wet from the good amount of rain we had on Friday, so I thought, hey run from home, that way I can smell all the nice things in bloom right now.

First I had to swim.  The workout called for 6x100 and then 10x200.  For some reason, I hate 200's.  They are in that grey area between 100's and 300+.  I got through the workout in good shape, and then went home to eat something before I headed out to run.  I decided on a piece of toast with jam and 1/2 can of Coke (not at the same time!).

My run was to be easy out and a little harder on the way back.  It was already nice and warm at noon, so I wore shorts and a singlet, and took my Fuel Belt loaded with Infinit. I am getting better at holding my pace down when I need to, but I'm not quite there yet.  Still, considering I'd trained pretty hard yesterday (3:30 bike and :40 run) and had swum, I felt pretty good.  Once again, I was rewarded with such sweet smells of spring, and so in my head I made up my top 3 flower smells:

1. Plumeria.  The smell of Hawaii!  I get to smell it again in November!
2. Oriental Lilies. I have a bunch of these, and they usually bloom in July, but this year I expect they will be early, like everything else has been.  Their fragrance is so nice, especially on a warm summer evening.  Just a few of the bulbs can perfume an entire yard, but I have like 20 or 25 of them blooming all at once.  They are my absolute favorite flower.
3. Viburnum 'Mohawk.'  I used to have one of these in my front yard, but it got yanked when the sidewalk was put in.  My neighbor planted one in the back, but it originally had too much shade.  I corrected that by removing some shrubs and a tree or two, with the result that while it is on the properly line, the shrub leans toward my yard and I get all the smell!  Lots of people plant these for spring fragrance, and they smell sweet and spicy at the same time.  There were plenty of them along my run route today, and a few of them I had to stop and put my nose right in them!

I ran easy, and practiced good form and easy running uphill on the way out.  It didn't matter how fast I was today, and I really wanted to enjoy it.  When I got to Hinsdale, in the window of the bike shop there I saw a Dutch-type bike that had skulls on it!  I had to stop, so I went in and asked if the skull decals were for sale.  Nope.  Well, they match exactly to the ones on the bed skirt that I made two years ago:

I told the mechanic dude that I had skulls on one of my bikes and he described Skull Kingdom!  He said he'd seen it, and I was puzzled--I never took it into that shop, as that would be like cheating on my bike mechanic, but it made me laugh that some random guy had remembered my bike!  Well, it is quite distinctive.

I soldiered on from there, and ended up running 2' extra after the 1 hour mark, figuring I'd negative split and I allowed for a good negative split.  When I was back with just under 5 miles to go, there was a freight train that I had to wait for.  No big deal.  There was some Crossfit whore who was walking, and she got caught by the train as well.  She was doing all these bending over stretches for the onlookers in cars, and I was laughing my ass off.  While she did have a good bit of muscle on her, she also had plenty of fat that if I had that much, I wouldn't be wearing tiny butt hugger shorts like she was.  Just to be funny, I flexed my biceps and took off my singlet so everyone could see my ripped upper body.  I'm sure all the cars stopped by the trains had a good time!

I had to pick it up on the way back, and the little rest for the train was nice.  Right after that, I climb back up for about 3/4 mile, then I got a nice downhill, and then the big 1-mile hill that's 3 miles from home.  I was feeling the heat by now, and cursed that I should have gone out slower, but oh well, too bad, must press on.

I was pretty happy that on the way out I averaged 9:18 and then 8:57 on the way back in!  So average pace for the entire run was 9:08!  A little better than the 10:13 I did last week in the 1/2 marathon.  I did have a few breaks, but I am still encouraged that my running is coming around.

For the week, I swam 13,400 yards, biked 185 miles and ran 32 miles.  Also 1.1 hours of strength work (I skipped some, but will get it all in this coming week, I'm sure).  And all that was with a rest day on Monday!  Holy shit!  My swimming is coming along--the Masters coach says I'm making fast progress on my stroke, which rocks.  I even took a turn at swimming 2nd in my lane on Thursday and kept up just fine.  I've got many more weeks of it to improve, but now I have better tools to do it, both in and out of the pool.  Biking will be tough to evaluate until I'm riding 100% outdoors, but for the amount I'm already doing, I feel pretty good.

All to the good, and I have 2 more weeks before the big remodeling project begins and the night class on Wednesdays.  I only have to keep my sanity for 8 weeks, and then I get to race at Triple T.  All systems appear to be working, so with that, I need to go eat again!

Hope everyone had a fantastic weekend!